Dr. Marvin Wachman (1917-2007) was a great advocate for educating young people. In a distinguished academic career, he served as president of both Temple University and Lincoln University and led the Foreign Policy Research Institute as president from 1983 to 1989. Throughout his life, he remained a passionate believer that “you never stop learning.”
Established in 1990, the Wachman Center is dedicated to improving international and civic literacy for high school teachers and high school students.

Cross-Strait Relations

On January 4, the People’s Republic of China announced the opening of four new flight routes over the Taiwan Strait. Instead of giving the region some time to process the announcement, planes began using these routes the same day. Due to the location of the routes and the unilateral nature of the announcement, Taiwan has protested the opening of the routes.

In the announcement, China noted that opening up these additional routes would help with delays in an already congested flight area. To the casual observer, such an announcement makes sense: if there are too many flights on a specific route, it would make sense to open new ones to prevent flight delays. Who likes when their flight is delayed?

Behind these new flight routes, however, is the poor state of cross-Strait relations. Since May 2016, China has cut official communication with Taiwan due to the inauguration of Tsai Ing-wen and her refusal to acquiesce in Beijing’s demand that she accept the so-called “1992 Consensus” and the related “one China Principle.” China has also recently increased the number of “island encirclement” missions, whereby Chinese bombers and surveillance planes fly around Taiwan and occasionally breach its Air Defense Zone. Talk of a Chinese invasion—although the possibility of invasion remains remote—has been a topic of much discussion since December 2017, particularly after a Chinese diplomat threatened invasion if a U.S. ship ever makes a port call in Taiwan. When compared to these other issues, a commercial flight route could be seen as innocuous.

But the new flight route is all a part of China’s strategy—ratchet up pressure on Taiwan in both large and small ways—especially while the world is focused on the crisis on the Korean Peninsula. If China continues to increase measures to force Tsai’s hand, which of the many threats would she ask China to limit or remove first?

In response to the announcement, Tsai tweeted: “Cross-strait stability is [important] to regional stability. Recent unilateral actions by #China – including M503 flight route & increased military exercises – are destabilizing & should be avoided. #Taiwan will continue to safeguard the status quo. We call on all parties to do the same.”

China opened a similar route in January 2015, and Taiwan protested due to aviation safety concerns—the flights then (and now) were 7.8km away from Taiwanese airspace and cross paths with some domestic Taiwanese flights. By March 2015, Taiwan and China reached an agreement that one southbound flight route would remain open but the route was moved further west and that before China would open new routes, it would do so after consultation with Taiwan.

There is one slight, yet extremely important, difference between the 2015 spat and now. In 2015, the president of Taiwan was Ma Ying-jeou, a member of the Kuomintang, the party that advocates for closer ties with China. Now, in 2018, Tsai Ing-wen is president, and she is a member of the Democratic Progress Party, the party with a less favorable view of China. That’s the only change in the situation and thus the reason that the routes were opened again and the reason that China won’t be as amenable to compromise this time.

Taiwan under Tsai has limited leverage to push back against a more recalcitrant China, but it has done several things to make its stance known to China and the world. To try to press China into some sort of dialogue, Tsai’s government has called on the United States, Canada, and other countries to support Taiwan in this endeavor and for their planes to avoid using the new route. On January 18, the Taiwan CAA confirmed that it “has provisionally delayed approval of applications by two China-based airlines to operate additional cross-strait flights during the Lunar New Year holiday in protest at China’s unilateral decision to launch a northbound M503 route.” This postponement will affect nearly 200 flights and about 50,000 passengers.

Tsai has also made Taiwan’s stance known to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), a UN organization that deals with global aviation issues. Unfortunately, since Taiwan is not a member of the United Nations, it is also not a member ICAO and cannot broach the topic directly. It must work through other indirect channels, specifically its formal and informal allies in ICAO. ICAO is not likely to do anything with Taiwan’s complaint because Taiwan is not allowed to be a member of the organization. Moreover, the Secretary General of the organization is a Chinese citizen, and Taiwan was excluded from the 39th Assembly in Montreal in 2016 after attending at China’s request in 2013.

For these reasons, it is unlikely that ICAO will work in favor of Taiwan even though according to ICAO guidelines, before a country makes a change to a flight route, it must work with “all parties concerned.” And China did not do that. In fact, China only notified Taiwan’s Civil Aeronautics Administration two hours before it sent out the official notification. At of the time of writing, ICAO has not formally responded to Taiwan’s complaint.

For its part, the United States has encouraged “authorities in Beijing and Taipei to engage in constructive dialogue, on the basis of dignity and respect,” but has not done much else. The United States should be more forceful in its rebuke of China’s unilateral action because since Tsai’s inauguration, China has shown it is not willing to have any dialogue with Taiwan. For now, to quote the great Yankees catcher Yogi Berra, “it’s déjà vu all over again” for cross-Strait relations.

The Shanghai Communique of 1972 and the U.S.-China Joint Communiques of 1979 and 1982 have been essential foundations of a bilateral relationship that has remained impressively stable while it has become much broader, deeper, multifaceted, and globally important than either side could have expected forty-five years ago, and as it has faced challenges created by China’s rapid rise.

The U.S. and China have had different understandings of these fundamental texts. To China, the Communiques embody binding international commitments. For the U.S., they are two sides’ parallel statements of deeply entrenched policies. Where China sees U.S. acceptance of China’s position that Taiwan is part of China, the U.S. insists that it merely acknowledges the existence of a view ostensibly shared on both sides of the Strait. From the U.S. perspective, the U.S.’s Taiwan Relations Act (TRA) and—less securely—President Ronald Reagan’s Six Assurances stand alongside the Three Communiques as authoritative statements of U.S. policy. For China, the additional documents lack such stature and have been sources of U.S. failures to implement commitments in the Communiques, particularly on arms sales to Taiwan.

Despite such divergences, the Communiques have underpinned a mutually acceptable framework for handling what was once the most serious problem for U.S.-China relations and remains a major area of potential discord today: Taiwan. For the U.S., the arrangement has meant adopting a “one China policy” that eschews support for “two Chinas,” “one China, one Taiwan,” Taiwan independence, diplomatic relations or security pacts with the government in Taipei, support for Taiwan’s joining states-member-only organizations, and so on. For China, it has meant acquiescing (although with objections) in U.S. policies and practices that support a functionally autonomous Taiwan, including robust informal relations, some level of arms sales, advocating Taiwan’s “meaningful participation” in the international system, and insistence that any resolution of the cross-Strait issue be peaceful and (since the Clinton administration) have the assent of the people of Taiwan.

Perhaps the most important practical contribution of the Communiques (and the TRA) has been to provide a fixed anchor for U.S. policy—one on which Beijing has been able to rely. Occasionally, U.S. presidents or officials have appeared to deviate from policies rooted in the documents. Sometimes, these moves seemed “pro-Taiwan,” as when President George W. Bush said he would do “whatever it took” to help Taiwan defend itself, or when President Bill Clinton offered what Beijing saw as excessive support for the unacceptably “pro-independence” Taiwanese leader Lee Teng-hui. Other times, the seeming shifts were “pro-Beijing,” as when Secretary of State Colin Powell indicated Taiwan lacked sovereignty and seemed to imply support for reunification, or when President Barack Obama omitted a robust reference to Taiwan, while reaffirming respect for China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, in a joint statement during his 2009 visit to China. When these disturbances have occurred, U.S. leaders have retreated to the “big four” texts and reassured nervous audiences in Beijing, Taipei, and elsewhere that there was no change in policy. This has been good for stability in cross-Strait and U.S.-China relations. The bounds the Communiques have set for both sides have helped contain even serious crises, including those surrounding China’s missile tests in the Strait in the mid-1990s and Taiwan’s referendum on entry into the United Nations in 2008.

Will this pattern persist in a new difficult period, with Tsai Ing-wen and Donald Trump in power? Trump’s early moves have been, at best, extreme versions of the apparent departures from established policy undertaken by other administrations. Trump appeared to move in a “pro-Taiwan” direction when he accepted Tsai’s congratulatory phone call. Much more alarming for Beijing, Trump declared the one China policy to be negotiable, and linked its continuation to possible Chinese concessions on issues ranging from trade to the South China Sea. Trump statements also shook Taiwan, where his suggestion that the one China policy was a “bargaining chip” in negotiations with China implied that Taiwan might be a bargaining chip too, and where candidate Trump’s less-than-reassuring statements about commitments to treaty allies such as Japan and South Korea undermined confidence in the U.S.’s thinner and less formal support for Taiwan’s security.

It is encouraging that the Trump administration has imitated its predecessors in returning to the shelter of long-established policy: Secretary of State Rex Tillerson affirmed that there were no plans to change the one China policy, and Trump promised, in a call with Chinese President Xi Jinping, that the U.S. would “honor” the one China policy. While these are welcome moves, concerns continue. Trump framed his pledge as granting a request from Xi, not as reconfirming unshakeable U.S. policy. Like many of Trump’s statements, it may be fleeting, soon to be undercut by a tweet. Disturbingly absent from Trump administration statements have been strong references to the Three Communiques and the TRA—the traditional underpinnings of stability in U.S. policy. Recommitment to those foundational documents is especially important today, with a U.S. leader prone to extraordinary volatility, a leader in Taiwan distrusted by Beijing, and a leader in China who has said that a political solution for Taiwan cannot be passed on “from generation to generation.”

On January 7, President Tsai Ing-wen of Taiwan will embark on a trip to the United States—not to visit President Barack Obama or President-elect Donald Trump, but to refuel her plane, rest, and conduct some meetings before moving on to Central America. This type of visit has become routine in U.S.-Taiwan relations and is nothing new or particularly special, so why is this trip so controversial?

Tsai is stopping in the U.S. en route to state visits to some of Taiwan’s diplomatic allies, specifically Honduras, Nicaragua, Guatemala, and El Salvador. News outlets have covered this trip not because these countries are four on a list of only twenty-one states with formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan or because Sao Tome and Pincipe recently switched its recognition from Taiwan to China (a long and growing list), but because Tsai will stop in Houston and San Francisco briefly during transit. Since 1994, every president of Taiwan has landed in the United States while en route to visit diplomatic allies. These visits have ranged from a few hours to a few days—depending upon the state of U.S.-Taiwan relations.

The president of Taiwan must receive special permission from the U.S. government to land or to stay in the country for any amount of time. This rule was established to ease the minds of the Chinese who are suspicious of any interactions between the U.S. and Taiwan that hints of any kind of diplomatic recognition. Since the U.S. severed ties with Taiwan in 1979, no president of Taiwan has participated in an official state visit in the U.S.—only brief stopovers and meetings with U.S. Congressmen and other people of note.

In a post-“Trump Call” world, China is on alert for any indications of a major change in U.S. policy toward Taiwan. As a result, the Chinese foreign ministry has been unusually quite vocal about the potential of a Tsai stopover in the U.S. When asked about Tsai’s visit, Hua Chunying, a Foreign Ministry spokesperson, said,

The one-China policy is a consensus shared by the international community, and also a principle of how we handle Taiwan’s engagement with foreign countries. We hope that relevant countries can carefully address Taiwan-related issues. As to the Taiwan leader’s transit in the US, I believe her real intention is clear to all. We hope that the US side can follow the one-China policy and the three joint communiques, disallow the Taiwan leader’s transit in the US, refrain from sending any wrong signal to the pro-independence force in Taiwan, and take concrete steps to uphold the overall interests of China-US relations and maintain peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait.

In early December 2016, another spokesman said that “the so-called transit diplomacy is only a petty trick played by the Taiwan leader, whose hidden political agenda should be clear to all.” Despite these protests, the U.S. granted Tsai approval, and she will be landing in Houston on January 7 and departing for Honduras on January 8, and then she will land in San Francisco on January 13 and return to Taiwan on January 15. Previous presidents have stopped over in Los Angeles, New York, Austin, Miami, Honolulu, and Anchorage—with the final city being the unofficial stopover location when ties between the U.S. and Taiwan are less than stellar.

Tsai has a busy schedule for her visit to Central America: she is visiting Honduras after being invited by its president, Juan Orlando Hernandez; she will attend the inauguration of President Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua; and she will visit Antigua in Guatemala to promote tourism between Taiwan and Guatemala. All of these visits and events are important for the continuation of relations between these countries and Taiwan, but the only feature of the trip extensively covered in the news is her stopover in the U.S. and China’s outrage over what had become routine.

The American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) noted to Reuters the routine nature of these visits: “President Tsai’s transit through the United States is based on long-standing U.S. practice and is consistent with the unofficial nature of our relations with Taiwan.” No matter how much the media or China tries to play up the controversy of this stopover, it should not qualify as exceptionally newsworthy. China’s perception of possible changes in U.S. policy and U.S.-Taiwan relations has caused even the smallest bit of information to be blown out of proportion. Did China raise a stink when Secretary of State John Kerry met with James Soong, Taiwan’s representative to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) in November 2016? How about when U.S. Ambassador Matthew J. Matthews, Deputy Assistant Secretary and U.S. Senior Official for APEC, visited Taiwan in early December 2016? No—because these visits are routine, nothing special, just like Tsai’s impending “visit.”

The one thing to look out for is who Tsai meets in San Francisco and Houston. During her visit stopover in Miami in June 2016, Tsai met with Senator Marco Rubio. Will anyone tapped to be in the Trump administration meet with her? If so, how senior of an official and from which department? The answers to these questions are important and could give a glimpse into how a Trump administration will handle the “Taiwan question” beyond the infamous phone call. The genuine issues at stake here are not a routine stopover, but the seemingly deteriorating relations between the U.S. and China, the apparent risks to cross-strait relations, and apprehensions about what the impending Trump administration will do come January 20, 2017 in regards to cross-strait relations and China policy.

On November 1, 2016, Hung Hsiu-chu, chairwoman of the Kuomintang (KMT), met with Xi Jinping, General Secretary of the Communist Party of China (CCP), at an annual forum between the KMT and CCP. This meeting received much fanfare in the media. The amount of attention that this photo op received may seem puzzling: Hung is not the president of Taiwan; she was such an unappealing presidential candidate that the KMT replaced her three months before the election; and the KMT does not hold the presidency or legislature making it the opposition party for the first time in Taiwan’s history. Hung kept floating the idea of promoting a “peace platform” even though she lacks any authority or mandate to negotiate or sign an agreement between Taiwan and China. In fact, it would be illegal. The Hung-Xi meeting only holds ceremonial importance, but even that characterization is a stretch. It has been incorrectly framed as another historic Ma-Xi meeting. That handshake represented years of negotiating, and having the sitting leaders of Taiwan and China finally meet marked a potential new chapter in cross-strait relations. That much hoped for chapter never materialized due to the KMT’s electoral collapse, and framing the Hung-Xi meeting in the same context does disservice to the historic nature of the meeting in Singapore last year.

For Hung, it is a desperate headline grab that will further alienate the KMT from the populace, and for Xi, it is an attempt to embarrass President Tsai Ing-wen, who has called for a resumption of “talks” between Taiwan and China. While this event does occur annually between the leaders of the two parties, the timing and circumstances for a peace deal are not right: Taiwanese identity is at an all-time high, and the historic election in January 2016 shows that the public mood is against further integration with China. If Hung wanted to push the KMT further away from the public and continue to lose elections, then she made the correct move. Her views on unification do not align with the broad base of the public’s, and they are so pro-China that it is one of the reasons the KMT replaced her when she ran for president in 2015. Why does Hung think that she has any legal or political mandate to even think about such a deal?

The way in which Hung acted before and during the “Cross-Strait Peace Development Forum” rankled members of both the KMT and DPP. Before the scheduled meeting, the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) publicly warned Hung not to address “politically sensitive” topics with Xi. After the meeting, DPP officials said that she let the nation down through her actions. She did not challenge Xi’s statements on “one China,” so the term “Republic of China” (Taiwan’s official name) was omitted from the record again. DPP officials also expressed worry about Hung trying to move towards a similar definition of “one China” with the CCP. New Power Party (NPP) chairman Huang Kuo-chang (a new party that formed after the Sunflower Movement) expressed his discontent with this meeting by saying that KMT was “toeing the Communist line of united front while distancing itself farther and farther away from mainstream Taiwan.” Also, before this meeting, KMT officials emphasized “one China, different interpretations,” which is former President Ma Ying-jeou’s preferred formulation. There are even reports that Hung argued with Ma over the 1992 Consensus and what “one China, different interpretations” means. If Ma—who advocated and maintained the status quo during his time in office—had to argue with her over the party’s interpretation of the 1992 Consensus, that shows how radical of a view she has.

As long as Hung controls the KMT, she could derail any chances that the party has of retaking major offices. The best hope for the party is that she gets ousted by a moderate member of the KMT so the party can work towards making meaningful policy changes that the public will accept. Hung and the KMT cannot hedge on a Tsai stumble or Chinese pressure to bring voters back into their ranks. This election solidifies a shift in Taiwanese political ideals, and the KMT must evolve to remain a viable party option. The party must move with the people, not vice versa. If ideologues like Hung continue to chair the party, create the platform, and pull stunts like the meeting with Xi, then the KMT is a lost cause.

Recent incidents continue to demonstrate how the People’s Republic of China is attempting to isolate Taiwan from the international community. These actions (both on the micro and macro level) bode ill for how China is going to engage with Taiwan under President Tsai Ing-Wen, whose election Beijing opposed.

Reports from a Shanghai bookstore show the nonsensical lengths that some people in China will go to “exclude” Taiwan. Bookstores are ripping “Taiwan” out of the Merriam-Webster dictionary before customers have the opportunity to purchase it. Other shops simply black out Taiwan-related entries. This “correction” removes any hint of recognition of a “Republic of China” or “Taiwan,” at the expense of other words beginning with the letter “T.” It is a crude method of censorship that boggles the mind—if Merriam-Webster produces dictionaries with apparently offending entries, why does the Chinese government allow them to be sold? It already bans Western social media websites and movies that promote “Western values.” Why risk the embarrassing news story? Ridiculous does not come close to describing these actions.

The dictionary incident follows another high profile kerfuffle over a popular Chinese television show—a game show where foreign students compete based on their Mandarin abilities—which omitted Taiwan from a map of China. Since China views Taiwan as a part of it, this omission sparked outrage online. Hunan Television, the channel on which the offending show aired, released a statement: “We feel a deep sense of dereliction of duty at the ‘problem map’ incident and feel deeply pained.” The station even clarified that all employees believe that Taiwan is not independent but part of China. The harsh reaction from these netizens shows how sensitive of a topic Taiwanese identity is on the Mainland. The choice of wordage in Hunan Television’s statement escalates the severity of the issue: being “deeply pained” and admitting a “dereliction of duty” are words one would not expect to find over such an omission. Taiwan’s existence as a de facto independent entity angers Chinese citizens who are fervently nationalist, and incidents like the “problem map” only remind the global community how seriously the “Taiwan Question” is treated on the Mainland.

While the two above examples show controversies stemming from Chinese citizens and businesses, another fresh controversy demonstrates that bookstores and netizens appear to take their cues from authorities in the Chinese Community Party (CCP). In September 2016, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), which is a part of the United Nations, rejected Taiwan’s request to participate in its 39th Assembly in Montreal. At this assembly, nations discuss aviation policy, and despite Taiwan’s central location within East Asia, ICAO still decided not to accept its request. According to Airports Council International, “More than 1.53 million aircraft carrying 58 million passengers passed through the Taipei Flight Information Region last year. In addition, Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport was ranked 11th and sixth busiest airport in the world in terms of passenger and cargo volumes, respectively.” This high level of air traffic alone should qualify it for a seat at these assemblies. Taiwan had participated in the 38th assembly in 2013 with the hope of continued participation. In 2013, China “asked for Taiwan to be invited.” This year, due to harsh Chinese backlash from Taiwan electing Tsai as president, China pressed ICAO not to allow Taiwan to join the assembly, and ICAO’s spokesperson said that it was “follow[ing] the United Nations’ ‘One China’ policy.” Countries from all across the globe have expressed their support for Taiwan’s participationin ICAO meetings and discontent with ICAO backing down due to Chinese pressure. Stickers saying “The sky is not made in China” have appeared at ICAO headquarters in Montreal in response to Taiwan’s exclusion. China hopes that by further excluding Taiwan from participation in international organizations it can force President Tsai to publicly adhere to the 1992 Consensus. However, such stories create sympathy for Taiwan and its people, and they also further perpetuate the perception of Chinese aggression in the region. China’s own actions paint it in a bad light and generate international support for Taiwan.

In early October 2016, Pewreported (ironically) that 77% of Chinese people think that “their way of life needs to be protected against foreign influence, and such sentiment is up 13 percentage points since 2002.” Considering these events, China and Chinese citizens are the ones negatively influencing the world around them, squeezing and alienating Taiwan and forcing China’s will on international organizations.

No matter what China does—short of war or extreme coercion—Taiwan will still be there as a (de facto) independent entity.

The summer of 2016 has proven to be a brutal one for the people, president, and pocketbooks of Taiwan. The Taiwanese began the summer months with a newfound sense of hope and rejuvenation after the successful peaceful transfer of power from the outgoing Kuomintang (KMT) to the incoming Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) in both the executive and legislative branches of government. These feelings did not last for long. Ravaged by two deadly typhoons—Nepartak and Meranti—the island nation faces millions of dollars in damages to its houses, roadways, and various agricultural sectors. In July, Nepartak caused NT$1.07 billion (over US$30 million) in damages to agriculture, and in September, Meranti caused over NT$850 million (about US$27 million). The southeastern counties, where these storms first made landfall, particularly Taitung County, were hit the hardest. Hundreds of thousands of homes faced power outages and water stoppages from damage caused by the sheer power of these two storms. A world-renowned coral site, known as the “Big Mushroom,” finally toppled after the constant impact of these strong storms in the Pacific Ocean. This formation, over 1,000 years old and the biggest of its kind, is no more. One of the few rays of hope from these two typhoons came from China’s Taiwan Affairs Office—the special government office that deals with cross-strait matters between China and Taiwan—when it offered condolences to victims and wished them well. This released statement was one of the few positive cross-strait interactions to occur since China suspended official communication with Taiwan in late May 2016 when Tsai Ing-wen assumed office.[1] These storms will undoubtedly affect the already struggling tourism industry across the country.

Typhoon Nepartak over Taiwan (Source: NASA)

Unfortunately, this particularly destructive summer of typhoons has not led to an increase in cooperation across the strait. Well wishes are about all Taiwan can hope for in the current state of cross-strait relations. Since Tsai’s election in January 2016 and subsequent inauguration in May 2016, cross-strait relations have soured, but relations between China and Taiwan began souring well before her time in office (i.e., Sunflower Movement, etc.). Various deportation “scandals” of Taiwanese nationals and declining numbers of Mainland tourists have put a very public face to the growing discord between China and Taiwan.

Cross-strait relations have almost entirely reset since May—China continues to assert itself both regionally and globally, and Tsai and the DPP-controlled Legislative Yuan (立法院) must be vigilant in trying to create more opportunities for Taiwan in the international sphere. Over the past several months, several countries have deported Taiwanese nationals suspected of various forms of fraud to China causing uproar. In April, Kenya sent 45 Taiwanese nationals to China, and in August, it deported another five individuals. These deportations sparked outrage because the people and government of Taiwan viewed it as a slight to their nation and as another instance for China to assert its power over them. While some have argued that this deportation process is normal operating procedure—Kenya sent them back to the city that they departed from—Taiwan’s government lodged complaints saying that these deportation were nothing more than “extrajudicial abduction.” China argued that these people flew out of China and targeted Chinese citizens with these scams and that as citizens of Taiwan (which China views as a rogue province), they were under the jurisdiction of China. This issue did not just involve Kenya—Armenia recently deported over 70 individuals to China, Cambodia deported another 13, and Malaysia sent 32 suspects. After the latest round of deportations from Armenia, Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council said in a statement, “We have repeatedly demanded the Chinese side not to deport our people to mainland China. The Chinese side’s action again disregarded our call … and further hurt the feelings of Taiwanese people.” Making these deportations such a large, international issue between China, Taiwan, and several other countries demonstrates Taiwan’s lack of options when pitted against China—not so strongly worded statements of condemnation. These countries chose to avoid challenging China instead of pleasing Taiwan.

China’s self-assertion also involves pinching local Taiwanese citizens’ pocketbooks by preventing Mainlanders from travelling to the island. The normal deluge of Mainland tourists to Taiwan has slowed to a trickle over the summer in response to Tsai’s election and her refusal to meet Beijing’s demand of accepting the 1992 Consensus. Though Tsai has moved towards the center recently in this regard, Beijing’s “red line” is its acceptance for the continuation of cross-strait relations. In 2015, between May and July, over 1 million Mainlanders came to Taiwan; this year, during that same time period, under 900,000 made the trip—the lowest since 2013—for a difference of nearly 150,000 tourists.[2] While that number does not seem too significant at face value, there are now that many fewer people renting rooms, using tour buses, taking taxis, frequenting museums and restaurants, and buying souvenirs. Places once full of tourists are now empty thanks to this 30% decrease in Mainland visitors. Workers rallied in Taipei to protest their current situation, and the government has set up a NT$ 960 million fund to help ease the burden. It has gotten so bad that counties not run by the DPP have sent delegations to China in order to encourage tourism to specific cities and counties that have a more friendly view of China. These leaders hope to increase tourism again and create new markets to increase economic interactions.

Taiwan President Tsai Ing-Wen (Source: Office of the President, Republic of China, Taiwan)

Tsai completed her first 100 days as president in August. They mainly have been characterized by a stalemate in cross-strait relations over how she has handled the 1992 Consensus. Her political capital after winning this historic election is slowly running out. Since her inauguration, Tsai’s approval rating has plummeted by 25% from 70% (in May) to 56% (in July) to 45.5% (in August). Another poll has her approval rating as low as 40.8%. She has now witnessed firsthand that running for president and being the president are two very different things and that the opinion of the electorate is fleeting—as her predecessor learned before her. As the months continue to pass by, Tsai may find herself backed into a corner that she put herself in and no viable path to move forward. Moving into autumn, she has the unenviable task of leading Taiwan through a typhoon recovery effort, a tourism shortage, an always-encroaching China as well as working towards rejuvenating Taiwan’s economy.

Sign Up

Join our Mailing List. Enter Email Address Below

The Foreign Policy Research Institute, founded in 1955, is a non-partisan, non-profit 501(c)(3) organization devoted to bringing the insights of scholarship to bear on the development of policies that advance U.S. national interests. In the tradition of our founder, Ambassador Robert Strausz-Hupé, Philadelphia-based FPRI embraces history and geography to illuminate foreign policy challenges facing the United States. More about FPRI »